Building a Hobby Farm- from woods to eggs

[jonbravado]

great posts - i have a similar scenario w/ 5.5 acres here in central SC.

Tororider - are those trees evergreen? messy?

keep up the posts on progress - i'll be posting mine soon.

congrats on your farm.

J

 

[tony123]

Toro, The reason I didn't think twice about chipping was the expense of the chipper. I didn't think about using the chippings though. I could pave my entry road with them. I'll make a call to see what a chipper would cost us.

Just called. $100 for half day and $180 for full day. Chips up to 4". My brush/tree pile is about the size of a large cement truck. I'm guessing 2 days work. I'm not sure its worth that much to me? If anythings bigger than 3" I'll burn it in the fireplace, and the rest might not make the best chips for roadway anyhow?

 

[tony123]

J, glad you're enjoying the posts. I'll be on the lookout for your project to learn more about it. I imagine in central SC you're flatter than we are. Do you have this much grade to work around?

 

[jonbravado]

it's fairly flat - but in 600 feet it drops almost 40 feet to the creek.

it's a strange tract, 260x1000 ft. roughly. a good homesite next to an old barn. 2 acres or so of prairie grass. and 3 acres of woods. it's surrounded by farms so it's more secluded than we would think at first.

i like the elevation changes upstate, but i know they can be tricky!!

J

 

[ALBALD1]

I started with chickens about 3 years ago. You shlould check this out. Backyard Chickens - Message Board - ezboard.com
That's the best chicken information site I've found & the people there are quick with answers if you have questions. I suggest reading in the archives to help plan your housing. Small suggestions you will find on there can make things a lot easier. You might start w/ 4-6, but most likely will end up with more. Chickens are very addictive. By the way, most of your laying breeds will start laying around 20 weeks old. After a couple months, they will be laying everyday. When winter comes on, they slow down somewhat unless you have artificial light. Their laying is related to daylight hours.

 

[Tororider]

Jon, Unfortunately they are decidious. I wouldn't call them dirty until fall when they have a ton of what are very much like weeping willow leaves, as with most leaves, easy to clean up when dry, not so much when wet.

Tony, I was lucky enough to be able to talk my dad into buying a wallenstein chipper, works great. We have almost 19 acres and a lot of dead ash thanks to the emerald ash borer. Not to mention lots of other dead wood so we figured we would use it a lot and was more efficient to buy than to try and rent for several weekends. We probably have 20-25 yards of chips already. For us, stuff over 5-6" is firewood so we have some pretty good chips from the 3-4" stuff, although the smaller stuff isn't terrible.

Can't wait to see the updated pictures later this week.

Albald1, I will have to check out that site too, then I can try to convince my wife we need chickens, hehe.

 

[tony123]

Al, thanks for the chicken link. I've spent an hour or so there already and it will be a big help. So far though, they make predators sound like a real pain in the rear end.

J, sounds like an interesting piece of land. I look forward to your thread.

The grader is doing our job as a moonlighting project, so we get an hour or two done each night before the sun goes down. Last night he worked an hour past dark. I hope to have some photos posted soon. Bear with me.

tony

 

[ALBALD1]

Just make your coop so you can close it up tight at night. I've found 1 coon & 1 possum trying to get in the pen, but they couldn't have gotten into coop anyway. the only predator deaths i've had was my own dogs grabbing a few.

 

[tony123]

Alright, I've got some update info finally. The excavator is finished with its work. I'm very pleased with how it all came out. Now if we can just keep the rain from washing the whole farm down the hillside we'll be doing well.

I ended up with about 80' of road out to an upper pad of roughly 70x30 then over to a midlevel pad of 30x30' for a pole barn and further down the ramp to the lower level pad of roughly 90'x50'.

I want to plant a cover crop over the exposed dirt, but with all the work left to do I don't know what would live through the trampling and tractor traffic. Any suggestions?

I don't have very good "overall" photos. My wife did all the picture taking and she seems to be more interested in the kids than the farm Just kidding, I'm sure you guys will enjoy some photos including the kids too. Like I said, they're the whole purpose for all this anyhow.

On to the photos.

This is how we started the morning today. Took the kids out to check the mail...it's a decent ride, at 600' of driveway.

This is me boxblading the upper pad. You can make out the 30x30 pole barn clearing just behind the tractor.

Some of the trees needed to be hauled out of the woods to a cutting area. Did that today. Probably about 10 sticks like this one. Again, this is the upper pad.

Excavator left the grapple in the way.....that **** thing is heavy.

With the density of all the small trees in the woods, we're cutting about half of them out and dragging them out this way. You can see the ramp on the right side, and I'm on the lower pad.

What you can't see is that those trees are attached to about 50' of wire mesh fence that I just pulled right out of the woods in one peice! It was awesome! Seemed like I was pulling half the forest with me.

I hope tomorrow to get some more panoramic shots for you all to get your bearings.

I told you we'd get to tractor photos.

tony

 

[3RRL]

tony,
Those are great pictures man.
I love that hay wagon ride and also your red dirt. Does it stay that color like after being exposed (dug up)?

 

[dieselfuelonly]

Those are some great pictures, I can gaurantee you that you will be having a lot of fun on your tractor!

 

[tony123]

Rob, the dirt stays that color no matter what you do.... I'm told that it is very high in iron content and it is actually rust that causes the color. One Christmas my wife made tie die shirts using the dirt as dye. They came out great and everyone has a shirt now that is stained with dirt from our yard I don't know if they thought it was as cool as we did.

Hey Dennis! Thanks for peeking in.

We're actually getting some light rain today! Just what I needed. Light enough to wet the dirt without washing it out. I need to run out and get some more winter rye today.

 

[3RRL]

Thanks for the reply tony.
LOL ... I had my share of tie die shirts in the sixties.

 

[tony123]

Seems my whole wardrob is "tie die" now that I have this tractor...hahaha I'm ruining more clothes than my dry cleaner.

Anyone have a marshmallow? I found something productive to do in the rain this evening. I'm not comfortable lighting up a pile any bigger than this, and I'll have about 12-15 of these to do.

 

[WayneB]

Not sure about the marshmallows, but just wondering how easy it is to get a burn permit where you live. Man around here there is no way we could set off a fire like that this year...................way too dry.

 

[scott_vt]

Mornin Tony,
Great pictures, especially the boys in the wagon ! It was fun when my boys were little like that, now there 24 and 26 Enjoy the moment !

 

[tony123]

Wayne, we don't need permits here. But, to take liability off, they want you to call both the fire department and forestry to let them both know what you're doing. They make sure they can pull up directions to your address and ask what you have to help contain the fire (garden hose works for them). They also let you know if you can burn on any given day. Of course, rain is usually a fair bet that you can burn.

Scotty, glad you enjoyed the photo. I do cherish every second I get with my boys. Would any of this be as fun without them? NOT.

 

[rox]

Tony, I also am enjoying immensly your posts ad your pics. Thank your wife for taking the time to take the pics. i jsut saw on a show, one of those home improvemnt shows or something like it about doing a driveway with block that lets he grass grow through. here are a couple links i found
Hanson Paver Products, Inc.
http://www.flowstobay.org/p2business/pdfs/4.8_Turf_Block_and_Permeable_Joint_Pavers.pdf

http://www.lcpaver.com/buyit/?specTurfBlock

Paving Expert - AJ McCormack and Son - Reinforced Grass Paving

With your slopes I am sure you probably ahve errosion control on your mind. When searching for a picture of the turf blocks I also read about permeable concrete adn that looked interesting for errosion control also.
Again really enjoying your posts you have a lovely family and a fantastic homesite. Good luck with the chickens.

 

[tony123]

Rox, welcome to the thread! Bienvenue! Merci beaucoup for the links on the pavers. I will check them out. In reality, this is going to be an underfunded farm, and will rely on weeds to stop erosion. Tonight we're getting our first decent rain since we graded. So I may wake up to a mess and have to increase funding. I visited your website. Looks like you have a wonderful place and are living your passion. That's great to see.

I went out at sundown tonight to check on the fire. It is still smoldering, but is really nothing more than ashes. It's nice to have that pile out of my way. I want to hold onto all the wood for our occasional campfires, but I just need to get stuff out of the way.

I worked the boxblade around a little tonight. Boy does it work so much better with some damp soil!

I went to the tractor store this evening and found about 105 pounds to add to my front bumper. On these slopes I get a little light in the front. I know nothing about the physics involved, but 105 pounds seems to be more than most people put on the front. I hope it makes the front end stay down a bit better.

I need to take some measurements tomorrow and draw a scaled drawing of what I've got to work with. It's time to start thinking about layout of all the different spaces we want. Vegetables, chickens, barn, where to put fencing, etc. I'll post the drawing when its ready.

 

[tony123]

Just checked on the fire this morning. It's still smoking! 48 hours later and through several rains.

Question: What do I do with these large piles of ash? Can I just spread it out and grade right into the soil? Is it helpful in vegetable garden soil?